


Finders Keepers

by Rod



Category: Without a Trace
Genre: AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-12
Updated: 2013-02-12
Packaged: 2017-11-29 00:26:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/680580
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rod/pseuds/Rod
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's something about Danny that bothers Martin, and he doesn't know whether he wants to get to the bottom of it or not.  Danny gets results, after all, and should Martin really look a gift horse in the mouth?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written for an AU challenge, from an idea sparked by Anne McCaffrey's short story of the same title.

When Martin asked Danny if he wanted a drink together after work, the last place he expected to end up was in the coffee bar across from the office. To Martin, drinks meant a beer, or a scotch if you really needed to relax. Coffee meant work, tea meant family, those god-awful herbal things meant college, and wine meant a date. In the interests of workspace harmony he had compromised on a soda, which he normally avoided since he really didn't need that much sugar in his diet, but it was yet another thing that threw him about Danny.

Then again, Danny Taylor was a whole bunch of contradictions wrapped into one good-looking package. Martin had done a little research before he joined the New York Missing Persons Unit just to find out who he'd be working with, and he knew from that that Danny had been orphaned when he was young, and had grown up in foster care in a less than desirable part of the city. Yet here he was, sharply dressed even by Bureau standards and sipping a cappuccino. The two images just didn't go together.

He was even more confusing to work with. Most of the time Danny affected a mild, even lazy amiability that let him get away with deeply cynical comments that would have gotten anyone else reprimanded. But when the need for action arose, Danny could be as hyper and unrestrainable as a five year old. When he turned on the charm every woman within fifty yards went weak at the knees, but Martin had never once seen him take advantage of that. When he wanted to talk about a case Martin had yet to get a word in edgeways, but wild horses couldn't drag more personal information out of him.

Hence the two of them sitting in the coffee bar, shooting the breeze. Martin had come to know Agent Taylor pretty well, from his interview technique to his unfailing inspiration, but he had realised that he didn't know Danny at all.

Martin took a sip of his soda, loosened his tie, settled back in his chair and sighed.

"Oh come on," Danny scoffed, "it wasn't that hard a day."

"It wasn't," Martin agreed, "but now it's over. That means I can relax, which means that I don't have to wear the tie any more."

"Maybe you need a wider collar?"

Martin made a face. "You try being made to wear a tie every day of your childhood and see if you don't pick up some irrational prejudices."

Danny smirked. "Ah, the price of privilege," he said.

Martin looked from Danny's coffee cup to his immaculate suit. "And this does your street cred so much good."

"Can I help it if I have an innate sense of style?"

"Face it, we're both rebels."

"Oh yeah?" Danny asked, grinning widely. "Tell me, oh son of Victor Fitzgerald, why exactly did you apply for this job?"

Martin grimaced again. He didn't like talking about his family connections, but he couldn't exactly expect Danny to open up while he kept his own life private. "Someone has to do it," he said.

"And you're that someone?"

"Therefore I have to do it, I know. Cynic."

"Idealist."

"Your problem with that is...?"

Danny smiled the kind of smile Martin thought he ought to smile more often, deep and genuine. "No problem. It's nice to meet someone who believes for a change."

"You make me sound like Mulder," Martin griped, "and trust me, you don't have the legs to be Scully."

Danny merely arched an eyebrow and smirked.

"What about you then?" Martin asked. "Why Missing Persons?"

Danny shrugged. "I'm good at it."

Martin cursed himself silently, though he kept all sign of it off his face. Most people wouldn't have been able to tell that Danny had withdrawn a little at that question, but Martin was a trained observer and had been watching Danny for a while now. Whatever reasons Danny had for joining the FBI had to be very personal, and much as he wanted to know, Martin couldn't bring himself to pry. "And so modest," was all he said.

"Look up my records sometime," Danny told him. Martin decided to take this as retroactive permission, since he already knew that Danny had a reputation for always getting his man. Well, almost always.

"The fact that the pay's pretty good helped my decision," Danny added.

"I'll drink to that," Martin laughed, raising his glass.

Danny laughed along with him, raising his coffee cup. He drained it and stood, reaching for his coat. "See you tomorrow," he said.

Martin nodded and smiled, waving Danny off as he sipped again at his soda. They would have to do this more often, he thought as Danny walked away. He liked Danny, enjoyed his company. They balanced each other; for all of the Mulder crack, Martin knew that he could be too trusting at times and Danny brought him back to reality. Of course Danny didn't trust anyone, and Martin had to bring him back to reality all the time, so their working relationship was hardly a one-way street.

He wanted to know more about Danny. What he did for fun, why he didn't drink, what he liked on pizza... how much he liked Martin. Martin wasn't quite sure if he liked Danny enough to take things further, but he knew he wanted to find out.

The next morning saw them at the home of Lori Cohen, trying to piece together the movements of her ten year old daughter, Sarah. At least Martin was trying to. He sat awkwardly across from Mrs. Cohen as she sobbed out the story of losing sight of her daughter while she played in the park, occasionally interrupting her with gently-voiced questions that teased a few more details out.

Danny meanwhile was pacing the room with restless energy, apparently quite unwilling to put on the charm for the distraught mother. Every now and then he would pause, pick up some picture or knick-knack and frown at it, but mostly he just paced. Mrs. Cohen didn't seem to notice, which Martin thought was just as well. Danny's behaviour was beginning to grate on Martin, so it was hardly going to soothe the over-wrought mother of a missing child.

Having allowed Mrs. Cohen to convince him that if she had an enemy in the world, it wasn't someone who would go so far as to kidnap her daughter, Martin changed tack. "I know this may sound strange," he said carefully, "but have you noticed anyone watching yourself or Sarah?"

Mrs. Cohen shook her head, sniffing and wiping her eyes with a handkerchief yet again. "I've been trying to think," she said. "I don't remember anyone, but I wasn't looking out for them, and oh God, what kind of a mother am I?" She paused, visibly fighting down her tears, then gave Martin a distraught look. "Do you really think someone snatched Sarah for... for..."

"No I don't, not if you didn't see anyone," Martin told her diplomatically. "I'm just trying to cover all the bases here. If you had seen someone and I hadn't asked, we could have wasted hours."

Danny paused in his pacing to lean on the back of Martin's chair. "Mrs. Cohen," he asked, "is there anywhere besides the park that Sarah goes playing?" He kept his voice soft, Martin noted, but his manner was still more abrupt than he usually was when dealing with missing persons' relatives. Evidently today was going to be a hyper day.

Mrs. Cohen frowned. "Sometimes I take her over to her friends' houses. That's all."

"You mentioned that you'd already called them?" Martin asked, flipping back a page in his notebook to check.

"Yes. None of them have seen her."

"Still, if you could let us have a list of their names and addresses, it would help if we could talk to them directly."

As Mrs. Cohen dutifully reeled off a list of Sarah's friends for his notebook, Martin wondered idly why Danny was in such an odd mood today. They had parted amicably enough last night, so what had happened since then to put Danny on edge?

He pushed the thought aside as Mrs. Cohen finished and looked at him expectantly. He got to his feet, smiling reassuringly. "We'll let you know the moment we know anything," he told her, then passed her his card. "Please call us if anything else occurs to you, however irrelevant it might seem."

Martin waited until they were outside the brownstone before turning to Danny and asking, "What was all that about?"

"Just covering all the bases," Danny said with a smirk.

Martin rolled his eyes. "Really?" he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm.

"Come on, Martin. That woman's got no enemies worth mentioning, not enough money to interest a kidnapper, and no signs of a stalker. I think little Sarah just got bored and wandered off. You know how independent ten year olds can be."

"So why hasn't she wandered back again?"

Danny shrugged. "Maybe she's still having fun, or she's got lost or stuck somewhere. We won't know until we find her."

"Well, Mrs. Cohen didn't exactly give us any leads," Martin said, grimacing.

Danny nodded. "We should give Vivian and Sam a hand down at the park," he said. "Whatever happened, happened there."

Martin had to admit that Danny had a point. They really ought to check through Mrs. Cohen's phone and bank records in case she had been concealing something, but that didn't seem likely based on the interview. No, unless a ransom note arrived, something that Martin had a gut feeling just wasn't going to happen, their most likely chance of picking up a lead was to canvass everyone in the park. He hated this stage of an investigation; so much depended on luck, and the longer it took them to get a break, the less likely it was that they would ever find little Sarah.

Vivian gave them a fishy look when they arrived at the park, just a few minutes walk from the Cohen's place, but Sam fell upon them with cries of joy and armfuls of Missing Person posters. Martin took a pile from her with a smile, leaving Danny to explain why they had shown up.

They concentrated on the play area at the near side of the park, the place where Mrs. Cohen had sat down to talk with her friends. Sarah apparently preferred playing with the slides and swings to running around on the open grass, something Martin found it difficult to get his head around. He'd taken open space for granted when he was young, there being no lack of it around his father's house, but now that he was closed in by New York all day every day he couldn't imagine any child not taking the chance to run free.

That was probably why he noticed Danny roaming wide across the park, a long way from the play area. He hurriedly finished taking the statement of the fiftieth person who had seen absolutely nothing useful and set off after his errant partner.

Martin caught up with Danny as he was talking to a hot dog vendor. "...off down that way," the man was saying, pointing down a side street.

"Are you sure it was her?" Danny asked, all business.

"Sure. I remember that blue checked dress, just like my wife's favourite tablecloth." The vendor shuddered.

"Why would she be going down there?" Martin asked him.

"There's a derelict lot a few blocks down. Kids can't resist playing on it, at least as long as their parents don't find out."

Danny snickered. "Now that I get," he said. "Thanks for your help."

"No problem. Hey, you want something to eat?"

Martin held up his hands with an uncomfortable smile. "Not before lunch," he said. "I have to put in enough hours down at the gym already."

He dropped the smile as he and Danny walked down the side street. "I thought we agreed to stick around the play area?" he said, trying not to sound too disapproving.

"To start with," Danny agreed, walking briskly. "A couple of mothers I talked to thought they might have seen Sarah over this way, and I decided to check it out."

"You should have called me over." That was what irked Martin the most; he'd had it drilled in to him time and time again that agents were not supposed to go into any situation alone, and yet here was Danny ditching him at the first opportunity. With an explanation that stank — Martin couldn't put his finger on the exact reason why, he just knew that Danny wasn't telling him everything.

"I was still within sight of you. I'd have called you when I got something firmer." Danny sounded a little pissed off himself, and Martin sighed. He knew he wasn't going to win this battle. All he'd achieved thus far was to make Danny withdraw from him again.

Martin fished out his cellphone and hit the speed dial. After the lecture he'd just given, he'd be in big trouble if he didn't let the others know what they were up to. "Vivian," he said as she answered, "it's Martin. Danny picked up a lead, we're chasing it down now."

It took them a few minutes to walk to the abandoned lot. The place was a magnet for kids, Martin had to admit. It had been partially demolished, then left for some reason with bits of old houses still intact. There were crumbled walls with gaps to squeeze through, hiding places aplenty, and fascinating rubble all over the place that would have any kid happy for hours. The developer must have filed for bankrupcy, that was the only reason Martin could think of for the city authorities to allow anyone to leave it in such a dangerous state.

There was no shortage of kids playing there, all of whom looked very guilty when they noticed the two men in suits watching them. Martin turned on his best smile while Danny waved expansively at them. "Hey guys," he yelled.

The kids mysteriously didn't bolt; more evidence, Martin thought sourly, that Danny's charm was unnatural. For him, kids ran away. For Danny, they actually came a bit closer. Definitely not natural.

He decided to try the tactful approach anyway. "Hey, we were wondering if you could help us. We're trying to find out—"

"Are you a pervert?" a little boy asked suddenly. "My momma told me not to talk to strangers because they were perverts who wanted to make me do bad things."

Martin knew he looked very put out as a small argument developed over exactly what the boy's mother had or hadn't said. He glanced over at Danny for some support, only to see his partner trying very hard not to laugh. Martin rolled his eyes. "No, I'm not a pervert," he said slightly too loudly, "I'm with the FBI."

"The FBI? Wow!" "I don't believe you." "She did too say that!" "Itwasn'tme! Inevertouchedanything!" "Can I see your gun?"

Danny finally decided to intervene, quieting the storm of noise Martin had provoked. "He can't show you his gun," he said solemnly, "because then he'd have to shoot you. He can show you his badge, though."

Martin was pretty sure none of the kids were fooled, but they all watched wide-eyed as he slowly pulled his wallet out and showed them his ID. "You're not in any trouble," he said quickly, before one little girl could start protesting her innocence again. "We're just looking for someone. Do you know her?"

They looked at the poster he held out. "Oh, Sarah. Is she in trouble?"

"She's gone missing," Martin told them earnestly. "Her mother asked us to help find her. Have you seen her this morning?"

The general consensus seemed to be that no, they hadn't seen her. The fact that she had gone missing was however taken as triumphant vindication of Momma's words.

"Have you been here long?" Danny asked. "This morning I mean."

The oldest boy scratched his head. "Not long," he said. Nobody contradicted him.

Martin paused, briefly reviewing the timeline of Sarah's disappearance. "Was anyone here at nine o'clock?"

Silence.

"I'll take that as a 'no'," he said, looking over at Danny.

"Is there anywhere in here you stay away from? Anywhere that's too dangerous to play in?"

The kids thought about this for a minute. "There," one of them said, pointing to a mish-mash of low walls that showed where a building used to be. "I don't like playing in there. It creaks."

"That's 'cos you're fat," one of his friends shot back.

"And there's rats," a girl offered.

"Yeah, well you stink."

Danny looked at Martin significantly over the small riot that started around them. Martin was frankly sceptical; Danny seemed to be putting a lot of faith into a doubtful comment made by a pre-teen who was about to get into a fight by the sounds of it. There was no reason for them not to check it out since they were here, but this had to be the flakiest statement Martin had ever acted on.

Tossing a largely ignored "Thank you" over his shoulder, Danny set off determinedly for the building. Martin trudged behind him, watching carefully for any signs of further collapse. He needn't have worried; Danny stopped beside a waist-high wall, looking down. When Martin joined him, he could see a large hole where flooring had collapsed into a basement, where a small figure in a blue checked dress was moving feebly.

"You call the paramedics," Danny said softly, "I'll let her know help is here."

Martin nodded, reaching for his cellphone.

It took the better part of an hour for the emergency services to make the ruin safe enough for the paramedics to get in, never mind to get Sarah out. Martin spent most of that time calming down Lori Cohen, who was still too scared for her daughter's safety to remember to be angry with her. They kept away from the hole for the most part, leaving Danny to keep up a constant stream of chatter with Sarah.

Eventually the little form was pulled up on a stretcher and whisked off to hospital with her mother by the waiting ambulance. Once they were gone, Martin finally allowed himself to relax. His job had been done for some while, from the point at which they found Sarah, but there was no way that he would have ever left the distraught mother alone. It might not be in their job description, but all of the team had seen to many shattered lives not to offer comfort when they could.

Danny sat down against the wall next to Martin and handed him a coffee. "Do you think Jack would spring for my dry-cleaning bill?" he asked. His suit was indeed covered in grime and brick dust, and Martin could hear the matching tiredness in his voice. That didn't mean that Martin was about to give him an easy time, though.

He gave Danny his best interrogator's stare. "What the hell were you up to?" he asked, keeping his voice low and level so that the bystanders would notice.

Danny blinked. "What do you mean?"

"You pulled together some pretty spurious logic to get us here. You got lucky taking us to the park rather than double checking Mrs. Cohen's records, you got lucky with the hot dog stand, you got lucky with the kids... Danny, you can't go playing hunches like that. What if you'd been wrong?"

"I wasn't. It all made perfect sense, right the way through."

Martin scowled in frustration. He couldn't disprove Danny's statement, but he was certain that Danny wasn't telling him the whole truth. "What if you'd been wrong? And what about next time? What if next time you take us off on a wild goose chase and somebody dies because we didn't check what we should have been checking?"

"I wouldn't do that. You'll just have to trust me on that, Martin, I'd never do anything to jeopardise anyone."

The trouble was Martin couldn't trust him, and from the look in his eyes Danny knew it. The stakes Danny was playing with were just too big; people's lives depended on them, and for Martin that meant he needed something a darn sight more concrete than a hunch before he'd give up on procedure. It wasn't like Danny was constantly out in left field, but he often made way more speculative diversions in an investigation than Martin was comfortable with.

Given their respective records Martin should have been taking notes on when to throw away the rule book, but the whole concept was alien to him. He didn't object to intuition as such, but he always bore in mind the fundamental truth about it; by it's very nature it was unreliable. When someone like Danny came along using intuition almost all the time, Martin had the uneasy feeling that it would all end in disaster some day soon. Which was an intuition in itself, but there was logic backing it up so Martin didn't care.

They drove back to the office in silence. There was no banter as they typed up their reports, no extraneous chatter as Jack introduced their next case, nothing more than efficient passing on of relevant information as Martin processed tax records and Danny tackled the phone company.

When he considered their afternoon in the privacy of his own ratty apartment late that evening, Martin couldn't make himself like it. In many ways they had worked like a well-oiled machine should — no distractions, just working through the information until the solution to their problem fell out. Efficient and effective.

Soulless. It was the chill between them that Martin couldn't take. He missed the chatter, the bouncing of wild ideas of each other, the camaraderie. He missed Danny, missed the cynical commentary that usually accompanied their cases, missed tossing his own more optimistic remarks back.

Ironic that this should all be happening because he couldn't bring himself to trust Danny, he thought. Normally he would have had no problem giving his trust, and Danny would have been the one to inject a note of realism. He wanted to trust Danny, and on a very personal level he did. It was Danny's habit of making leaps of faith that he didn't, couldn't trust.

He wondered briefly if he was just jealous. Martin didn't trust his own intuitions about cases very much, always feeling that they were a luxury that the people he was searching for couldn't afford. Seeing Danny so blithely following his own nose and succeeding, he had to admit it was a little galling. He was learning, though, relaxing his methodical approach when he came up with a strong enough reason to, so maybe it wasn't that.

In the end, it didn't matter. In the end, it came down to whether or not he could trust Danny's judgement as much as he trusted Danny's intent. That wasn't something he could decide easily, and it was a thought that chased him through a night of uneasy sleep.

It was a sombre Martin Fitzgerald who dragged himself into the office the following morning. His dreams had given him no answers, no more than his TV or his ceiling had. It wasn't until he entered the room and saw Danny staring listlessly at his computer that he knew. He just knew, and nearly laughed at the irony of trusting his own intuition this once.

Danny looked like he'd had just as bad a night as Martin. He looked tired, from the heaviness under his eyes to the creases in his normally immaculate suit and shirt. There was none of the usual energy or enthusiasm that Martin associated with Danny, just a tired man working an important job. Martin knew it was all his fault, and he also knew how to fix it.

Danny looked up in surprise some minutes later as Martin placed a cup of coffee next to him. "You looked like you could use it," Martin said.

"Yeah, well. Bad night."

"I know that feeling."

"It's just some days, I got to wonder whether I do more harm than good."

"Don't think that," Martin told him, his voice low and intense. "You're good at this job. Sarah Cohen and God knows how many others are alive because you can put the right pieces of information together in the right order. And..." He paused, took a deep breath and started again. "And I trust you."

It flew in the face of all his common sense, of everything except the most basic core of himself, but the moment Martin said the words he knew they were true. He did trust Danny. More, he wanted Danny to trust him. Perhaps he might eventually let himself want more than that, but for now he wanted that trust so badly he could taste it.

The smile that spread slowly across Danny's face gave him hope.

Danny picked up the coffee and took a sip, tacitly accepting Martin's unvoiced apology. "What brought on this change of heart?" he asked.

Martin looked down. "What you're always ribbing me about," he said. "I believe in people. Maybe too much sometimes, but it's who I am. I couldn't be true to myself and not trust you."

Danny smiled at him again. "Sometimes you're too good to be true, you know that?"

"This doesn't mean I'm not going to argue with you every step of the way."

"I wouldn't have it any other way. Now get your ass back to your desk, Jack wants some results from us."


	2. Chapter 2

Martin tried not to wince as Victoria Masters waved her gun in his general direction again. Being on the wrong end of a firearm was never reassuring; being also tied securely to a radiator alongside the person you were supposed to be finding when the gun was being wielded by someone mentally unstable did not make matters any better.

It was a classic screw-up. The team had been looking for a young man named Jerry Callen, someone who everyone kept saying could pass for Martin's younger brother. Sitting uncomfortably next to him now, Martin still couldn't see the resemblance.

They had been overstretched. There were so many possible leads to track down that there was no chance of sending agents out in pairs if they wanted to make good use of that vital first twenty four hours. That was why Martin had been sent to Mrs Masters on his own, something that even now he couldn't blame Jack for doing. There was some chance that Callen had gone to her looking for lodgings, and questioning a little old lady shouldn't have been a problem for an active young FBI agent. Yet here he was...

Mrs Masters had seemed nice enough, if not quite as old as Martin had imagined. She had been confused, gone off at tangents and shown some signs of paranoia, but she had offered Martin enough cups of tea to float a good-sized yacht. She had also talked like someone out of a period novel, completely at odds with her apparent lack of wealth and strong Brooklyn accent. It had all felt quite uncomfortable, and Martin found himself mildly worried for her welfare. However she only became really scary when he started to leave.

When Martin had stood up to go, Mrs Masters became obviously distressed and begged him to stay. It wasn't fair to her, she told him tearfully. Martin couldn't help but feel a bit sorry for her, but he was running late already and she wasn't helping his investigation. He explained to her repeatedly that he had important work that had to be done right then, promised to come back (a promise he had absolutely no intention of keeping), and finally agreed to let her "at least give you some cookies to keep you going until dinner time."

He had certainly intended to check in with Jack while Mrs Masters was in the kitchen, but he was fuzzy about whether or not he had actually done so. The next thing he was certain of was waking up with an incredibly sore head and his hands securely tied behind his back, while a nearly incoherent Mrs Masters talked to an equally securely tied Jerry Callen. From the feel of it she had hit him over the head with something, although how she had sneaked up to do that was a mystery to Martin.

Right now she was staring at Martin as if she expected him to say something. He squinted at her, trying to push away the pain in his head and remember what she had just been saying. He failed on both counts, and couldn't stop a groan slipping out.

Bizarrely, that seemed to satisfy Mrs Masters. "Well, I'm glad we've got that sorted out, Richard," she said, standing straight and tucking the gun away.

"Huh?" Martin concentrated, projecting sincerity as best he could under the circumstances. "I think maybe you've got me mixed up with someone else, Mrs Masters. My name's Martin F—"

"Oh don't be silly, Richard. I recognised you the moment you walked through the door."

"Look lady," Callen piped up, "we can't both be this Richard guy."

"I told you," Mrs Masters said firmly, "I recognised you the moment you walked through the door. A mother always knows her child, no matter how long we're separated. Just changing your name was never going to fool me, Richard."

"But there's two of us!" Callen howled in frustration.

"And that was very clever of you, dear. I'd heard about cloning of course, but when your father and I sent you off to college we had no idea you'd be learning anything so clever. I'm so proud of you."

Martin exchanged a baffled look with Callen at this piece of logic-defying reasoning. Mrs Masters was obviously as batty as all hell and had latched onto some similarity between them and her presumably missing son, but beyond that who knew what she was thinking? Given how thoroughly she was buying into this whole thing, talking her down wasn't going to be the easiest of jobs. Not that Martin was in the best of conditions to be undertaking hostage negotiations anyway. Perhaps, he thought, it would be better to persuade her to go away and give him some recovery time.

Mrs Masters' beam of maternal pride slipped into a look of sorrow. "It was very thoughtless of you to run away like that," she said. "Your poor father never recovered, you know. He wouldn't talk about you at all afterwards."

"We're sorry," Martin said quietly, trying to catch Callen's eye. He hoped the younger man would get the message; their best chance at the moment was to play along, calm Mrs Masters down and wait for an opportunity.

Callen mumbled something that might have been an apology, and Martin breathed easier. Mrs Masters seemed to take it as such, in any event.

"Sorry's all well and good," she said, "but you've caused a lot of trouble and heartache." She pondered for a moment, while Martin shivered. He got the distinct impression that she was treating the two of them as one person again.

"You need to be punished," she said mildly. Martin felt Callen stiffen next to him. "You shall stay in your room until you've learned your lesson."

Martin hung his head in what he hoped was a reasonable facsimile of shame. Beside him, he heard Callen draw in a breath and nudged the younger man. Now was not the time to argue.

Mrs Masters smiled benignly at them. "I'll bring you some tea later," she said and finally left them alone.

Martin leant back against radiator in relief that was only slightly tempered by the sound of the door being locked. Now that Mrs Masters was no longer watching him, he could start work on escaping. Providing that whoever was stomping on his brain in army boots let up, and if he could work the ropes loose. Basic escapology wasn't exactly high on the training schedule for agents working on white collar crime.

He looked across at his co-prisoner and attempted a reassuring smile. "Martin Fiztgerald," he said by way of greeting. "FBI Missing Persons Unit. I'd shake your hand, but I'm a little tied up right now."

Callen rolled his eyes at the weak joke, but at least he smiled a little. "Jerry Callen," he said in return. "Missing Person. I guess you found me."

"Go me," Martin said wryly. "It won't long before my colleagues notice I haven't checked in and come for us. They'll probably be here before we can get free."

"I hate to burst your bubble, but we ain't in the crazy lady's place any more."

Martin blinked. "OK. We have to be pretty close, though, and now they know to concentrate on Mrs Masters. It'll only take them a little longer to find us."

Callen looked at him sceptically. "Took you long enough to find me," he said.

"We had a lot of leads to follow up," Martin told him with a shrug. "It took a while to find the right one."

"Ten bucks says they won't be here within an hour."

Martin hesitated only briefly. If it were him out there doing the looking, then it might take him longer than that to follow whatever trail Mrs Masters had left behind. Danny, on the other hand, would pull one of those huge intuitive leaps of his out of the bag and be there in ten minutes. "You're on."

There was a short pause, then Callen asked, "I don't suppose you know what the time is?"

Martin automatically tried to look at his watch... which was on his wrist, firmly tied behind his back. Just like Callen's. The two of them looked at each other and burst out laughing.

Laughter might be good for the soul, Martin reflected moments later, but it was hell on headaches. He winced and tried to relax; if breathing techniques worked on stress headaches, maybe they would work on the pain from being hit with a frying pan. Or whatever it was that Mrs Masters had used.

"You OK?" Callen asked, sounding concerned.

"Yeah," Martin said wearily. "I'm still recovering from being hit over the head, that's all. Give me a few minutes to get it together."

The breathing was working, at least a bit. Martin let his mind wander as he relaxed, wondering how the rest of the team would be handling his abduction. Jack would be angry but professional, he decided. Martin would be lucky if he was let out to buy coffee on his own after this, but at least he had a boss who gave a damn. Vivian would be the perfect inscrutable agent. It wasn't that she didn't care, she just never let that affect her work. In many ways it was Vivian that Martin idolised as an agent; Jack could be a maverick, and Martin appreciated that there were times that rules needed to be bent, but Vivian seemed to get everything done without half the drama that came with Jack.

Sam would probably be worried. He hoped. She of all of them had the hardest time playing the emotionless agent, at least when someone else was in the firing line. It wouldn't stop her working, but she would worry. Maybe he would get a kiss out of this to make up for being kidnapped, Martin thought. Well, a man could dream. He had daydreamed often enough of kissing Sam, even after he knew she had her eyes firmly set on Jack, that he was pretty sure just how much he'd enjoy the experience.

Danny... Danny was the one Martin wasn't sure about. On occasion, Danny could take some of their cases awfully personally, at which times God help anyone who got in his way. It usually took a case that hit close to home to do it, a kid in trouble who reminded Danny of himself. Danny had been as professional as Martin had been when Sam got stuck in a hostage situation, but part of Martin hoped that Danny might shift into overdrive for him, even though he wasn't sure that he wanted to deal with the implications of that yet. He trusted Danny implicitly, and he wasn't entirely averse to the idea of going out with another guy, but he was wary of wrecking the relationship they did have.

"Hey, FBI guy, wake up," Callen called.

Martin prised open eyelids that had somehow closed while he pondered his colleagues. "I'm awake," he said grumpily. "Don't worry, we'll get you out of here."

Callen looked unimpressed. "I'm pretty sure you aren't supposed to go to sleep with a head wound."

Martin looked at him.

"Hey, I watch ER as much as the next guy!"

Martin, the next guy in question, hadn't watched ER since George Clooney left, but he didn't think it would help to mention that. Instead he rolled his eyes, wished futilely for some Advil, and started the long, tedious process of trying to get free of his bonds. He talked to Callen as he worked away, getting him to fill in the details of his abduction. The way Martin figured it, it helped to keep them both occupied, and it should speed things up when they finally were rescued.

About half an hour later, as best Martin could reckon it, the door was kicked open. Danny burst into the room like an avenging angel, gun drawn and eyes hard. He swept the room as rapidly as procedure allowed, then took two rapid steps over to Martin and began untying him.

"What the hell were you doing?" he growled.

"Good afternoon to you too," Martin replied before turning to Callen. "That's ten bucks you owe me."

"No way!"

"That was well under an hour, and you know it."

"What are you talking about?" Danny demanded.

"He's delusional," Callen said before Martin could get a word in. "Probably because he was hit over the head."

"He's just... hey!" Martin tried to shake off Danny's hands as his head was gently but insistently probed for damage. He might as well have tried shaking off an octopus for all the good it did, so he concentrated on freeing his hands instead. Moments later he was holding Danny's wrists in his hands, looking into his colleague's worried eyes. "I'm fine," he said simply.

Danny looked... actually worried wasn't the word, Martin decided. Even though he could see perfectly well that Martin was OK, Danny still kept visually checking him over as if he couldn't quite believe that Martin didn't have some huge gaping wound somewhere. Then they would lock eyes for a moment, and Martin would see what he thought a tinge of fear in amongst the concern and anger Danny was radiating. Was there love there? Martin was surprised at how much he wanted to see it, but Danny's eyes would flick away again before he could allow himself to be sure.

There was a cough from beside them. "If the touching reunion is over...?"

Martin shot Callen a glare. "Mr Callen, this is Agent Taylor. Danny, this is Jerry Callen, our missing person. Who is apparently delusional without the benefit of a head wound, since he thinks it took you more than an hour to find me."

Danny smirked. "He said that? You said that?" he asked Callen. In an instant the concern was locked away, and Danny was his usual teasing self. If it was maybe a little more forced than normal, well Martin couldn't be certain that he wasn't just seeing what he wanted to see.

"I'm wounded, I really am," Danny was saying as he went to untie Callen. "I ought to leave you tied up for such lack of faith in us."

Callen and Martin both shuddered. "Not funny," Callen said flatly. "I had that crazy dame spouting lines like that all day. I could live without ever being told I'm a 'naughty boy' again." Danny paused in dealing with the ropes to lay a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

Martin bit down on a twinge of jealousy at the sight. "Besides, it would mess up your paperwork," he said instead.

Danny flashed him a grin. "I'm guessing the office trip to the S&M parlour is off then."

"Nice to know my tax dollars are being well spent," Callen mock-grumbled. "How did you find me so fast anyway?"

"Hey, leave us some professional mystique here," Martin said quickly. He ignored the look Danny sent him; it was enough for him that Danny had found them. Martin trusted Danny and he wasn't going to strain their friendship again by calling him on his methods. Whatever they were, and no matter how much he actually wanted to know. "What took you so long anyway?"

Danny shrugged. "Downtown traffic's lousy this time of day."

It took the rest of the afternoon to clear the case up, not least because Danny insisted on getting both Callen and Martin checked over by paramedics. Martin tried not to grumble — it was standard procedure after all, particularly given that he'd been knocked out — but all the fussing about was beginning to give him a headache that had nothing to do with his potential concussion.

It was bad enough that they wouldn't let him drive. He'd had to leave his car behind, neatly parked outside Mrs Masters' apartment, after the paramedics told him point blank in front of witnesses not to get behind the wheel for at least twelve hours. They weren't entirely happy about not taking him in to hospital for a full checkup, but at least he made that stick. As he pointed out, he was going to be in the company of trained investigators, people who were likely to notice if he had dizzy spells and passed out. It helped a lot that Danny agreed to keep an eye on him, even if he had to add a smart remark about Martin getting lost otherwise.

That was why Martin was sitting grumpily in the passenger seat as Danny drove him home. Martin hated being driven at the best of times, and with his head still somewhat tender this was most definitely not the best of times. It was just one more indignity piled onto the rest of a pretty ignominious day, all things considered.

Though just this once being chauffeured around had its benefits, Martin thought as he glanced across at Danny. It did allow him to contemplate the mystery and, being honest, good looks of Danny Taylor while said mysterious and good-looking person had his attention on the road. As far as Martin was concerned that was something well worth contemplating, and he didn't get many opportunities to study Danny close up.

Martin was no nearer to understanding Danny now than when they had first met. He liked him, for all the contradictions Danny constantly threw at him. He might well be interested in taking their friendship further, if Danny gave an indication that he was interested back. And there, Martin thought, lay all of his problems.

Danny did flirt with him on occasion, but then he flirted with everyone. Martin couldn't tell if he was ever genuine about it, whether the teasing smile and occasional touches Danny gave him meant more than they did when he grinned at Vivian or goofed around with Jack.

It didn't help that Martin couldn't seem to sort his own feelings out on the subject. He liked Danny, sure. He trusted Danny, or at least he tried to. On the other hand, so much that Danny did or said made him uneasy. The risks he took on a case, the way he trusted his gut in the face of common sense, the way he was always right... these were all things that profoundly disturbed Martin on an instinctual level. Which was highly ironic given that it was Danny's instincts that were troubling him, but Martin knew better than to go down that line of thought.

Martin closed his eyes, wishing that it could all be as simple as his daydreams. In those there were no outside complications, no Jack for Sam to moon over, no prejudices for Danny to get past. In those he could just lean over and lightly kiss him, the scent of Danny's aftershave filling his nostrils. He could almost feel the quirk of those familiar lips as they smiled against his skin, the rough prickle of five o'clock shadow, the—

"Hey, no sleeping on the job!"

Martin opened one eye and glared. "I was not sleeping," he said crossly. Trust Danny to interrupts a perfectly good daydream that he was starring in. "I'm not on the job any more either. Just get me home and I'll see you in the morning."

"Oh no you don't. You may have fooled the EMTs that you're all right, but I know you better than that. At the very least you're going to sit around and brood about what you get for not following procedure."

"Can we not go into my multiple failings right n— What do you mean, brood? I don't brood."

"No, you just sit around worrying so hard about whether you're only in the job because of your old man that even Vivian is tempted to slap you."

Martin shook his head. He was morally certain that Danny had snuck a compliment in there somehow, but he wasn't up to that level of conversation just yet. Maybe in a beer or two's time, but not now.

"Look, Danny, let's just pretend we had this argument, OK? I've had a bad day, I'm tired and I've got... and I'm grouchy, and I don't want to have to deal with anything until morning."

"And you've got a headache," Danny said with a smirk.

"I've got a bruise on my head the size of an egg, the surprise would be if it didn't hurt. What I do not have is concussion."

"Uh-huh. I'll believe that when you stop falling asleep on me." Danny smiled sweetly, and Martin cursed his imagination for taking the comment literally. Falling asleep on Danny was not something he needed to think about right now, pleasant as the idea was. "We're here."

Martin blinked. Danny had indeed pulled up outside his apartment building while he hadn't been paying attention. "Thanks," he said, getting out of the car.

"No problem," Danny told him, getting out himself and locking the car up. Martin looked at him. "Aren't you going to invite me up for a coffee?"

"What makes you think you rate coffee?" Martin asked, off-balance yet again. He was too tired and grouchy to have any hope of working out whether Danny was really flirting with him or not.

"That would be my devilish charm and my boyish good looks. Plus the only reason that you're not spending the night in a hospital gown is that I promised the EMTs you wouldn't be alone overnight."

Martin stopped dead on the steps. "It didn't occur to you ask?"

"I could always call them back if you'd like. I'm sure they'll have saved some blue jello for you."

"I don't... gah! Come on up then."

Martin pointedly took the stairs up to his apartment, letting Danny know that he didn't need a nursemaid. His sullen silence worked about as well as ever, which was to say not at all; Danny followed along behind him radiating his usual bonhommie, smiling affably when they encountered one of Martin's neighbours.

Finally Martin unlocked his apartment door and stalked in, loosening his tie and tossing his keys onto the kitchenette worktop as he went. "Coffee's in the fridge," he called as Danny closed the door behind him.

"Huh?"

"It keeps fresh better."

There was a momentary silence as Martin sat down in his armchair in front of the TV. Then he heard Danny's familiar amused snort. "Aren't we in a good mood tonight."

"Apparently I'm an invalid likely to slip into a coma at a moment's notice. I shouldn't be around dangerous equipment like coffee machines."

Martin tried to ignore his not entirely welcome guest, but it proved harder than he had first thought. Making coffee seemed to involve large amounts of rustling of packets, clanking of cups, gurgling of the machine and so on. By the time the smell of coffee was permeating the apartment, Martin was hyper-aware of Danny putzing about behind him.

Somehow he was still surprised when the coffee mug appeared in front of him. He looked up to see Danny smiling amiably.

"You looked like you could use it," Danny said quietly.

Martin knew a peace offering when he saw one, but his pride wouldn't let Danny off the hook quite so easily. "I could use a beer," he muttered.

"Beer and Tylenol, that's a good plan."

"If I had any Tylenol..." Martin trailed off as Danny opened his hand to reveal a familiar and very welcome box. "You bought me Tylenol?"

"You looked like—"

"I could use it. I got the message." Martin turned away as he tore into the box and swallowed the painkillers, hoping that he wasn't blushing too badly. While the dull throb in the back of his head wasn't really hurting all that much, he was touched that Danny had been so thoughtful. And if he'd rather have washed the pills down with a soda instead of coffee, well, he could have asked in the first place.

"Now I'll be awake half the night," he mock-grumbled.

"That's the idea."

Somehow, even that didn't let Martin recapture his earlier grouchy mood. It wasn't long before the two of them were watching a ball game, shouting at the umpire's decisions and egging each other on like kids.

It had been a long time since Martin had felt this relaxed, he reflected. Spending the evening with Danny was just plain comfortable, even knowing that there were things Danny wasn't telling him. Martin shook his head, wondering at that. He hated going with his gut, but that's exactly what he was doing; his gut told him he was safe with Danny, and he accepted that. Not without a little kicking and screaming, but he did trust Danny to look after him.

Then again, maybe it wasn't his gut that was doing the talking. Martin glanced across, catching sight of Danny taking a bite out of the pizza Martin had been persuaded to spring for, and was struck again by how handsome Danny was. It was more than just the curve of his jawline and the smile he always wore, Martin decided. It was the elegant economy of his movements, the whole manner of him; the way he looked out from under half-lidded eyes, the way he... frowned?

"What? Have I got food on my chin or something?"

Busted. "Uh, no," Martin said, trying not to stammer. "I was just thinking."

Danny's frown deepened. "You sure you're OK? If you're zoning out on me, Martin, I'm taking you straight to hospital. In handcuffs if necessary."

That was real concern, Martin realised. He turned on a smile and tried to reassure Danny, his mind racing. Martin knew the dangers of wishful thinking, but Danny was concerned now, and he'd been weirdly almost afraid back when he had rescued Martin. Maybe, just maybe, Danny like Martin the way Martin wanted. Or at least enough not to punch him out if asked. Unless he'd got it all wrong, and Martin was reading way too much into Danny's friendship, and... well, hell. He could go around that circle all day, and mostly had.

"OK, that's it," Danny said firmly. "Something's up. What's hurting?" He stood, reaching for the phone.

"Nothing!" Martin said, startled back to the conversation. "Nothing. I just... I was trying to figure out what to do about you."

"Me?"

"You're very distracting." Way to go, Martin thought. If that doesn't insult him, nothing will.

Danny, perversely, smirked. "I'm distracting?"

"Yes." Martin took a deep breath; now or never, he thought. "When I've spent all afternoon wondering what it would be like to kiss you, you're distracting. When I've spent weeks wondering if there was any chance you might be interested in me as more than a colleague, you're distracting." He paused. "And now I've spent about twenty seconds wondering if I'll need to put in a transfer request in the morning, you're sure as hell distracting."

Danny's eyes never left him. "You were thinking about kissing me?" he asked almost wonderingly. Martin nodded, scarcely breathing as Danny stood over him. "There was some... thinking going on over here too," Danny admitted.

"So... maybe we should—"

Danny swooped, capturing Martin's mouth in a blistering kiss. After a long moment that left no doubt that Danny was indeed interested, he pulled back, leaving Martin with the rough sensation of his stubble and the scent of his aftershave.

"Did that measure up to your imagination?" Danny asked with that secret grin that Martin had so fallen for.

"Hell, yes." Martin's answering grin felt like it nearly split his face in two. "How about you?"

"Mm. I think I need a second opinion."

Martin found himself abruptly too busy to respond to the teasing, as Danny did his best to kiss the living daylights out of him. It was some while before they came up for air again, hugging each other close, with Danny practically sitting on Martin's lap.

"Oh yeah," Danny murmured into Martin's neck. "That'll do nicely." They simply held each other for a long moment, Martin stroking Danny's back as he luxuriated in the sheer presence of the other man.

"About that transfer," Danny began.

"Forget about it," Martin said instantly. He felt rather than saw Danny's smirk.

"And here I was all ready to transfer us to the bedroom."

Martin laughed. "Suddenly not going to sleep seems like a really good idea."

It was, he reflected in the morning. They had slept, eventually, and Martin woke to find himself comfortably spooned around Danny, filled with a glorious lassitude that made spending the rest of the day in bed an amazingly attractive idea.

Unfortunately it wasn't an option, he thought, slapping his alarm clock off by reflex as much as anything else. Duty called, and if they didn't answer someone could die. Even so, as Danny opened his sleep-bleary eyes and gave him that soft, secret smile, Martin couldn't resist leaning in and gently kissing him to full wakefulness.

Finally, regretfully, Martin broke away. "Come on," he said. "You shower first, I'll start breakfast."

"We could shower together, save time," Danny suggested innocently.

Martin looked at him sternly. "How exactly would that save time?" he asked. "We'd be lucky to get out this side of midday."

"Can't blame a guy for trying."

It did take longer than Martin originally thought, largely because each time they passed each other they stopped for another kiss, but eventually they were fed, showered and ready for the final element of Martin's morning ritual: the search for his apartment keys.

"Kitchen worktop," Danny said, not even glancing over there as Martin patted his pockets down.

Martin looked over, saw his keys, drew breath, and stopped. He wasn't going to ask. Even with this blatant a reminder of how well Danny could find people, Martin wasn't going to break the trust that the two of them had built up. He didn't need to know, and he sure as hell wasn't going to risk their relationship so quickly.

"I wish I could tell you how I do it," Danny said quietly.

"Don't," Martin said quickly, grabbing the keys. "I trust you."

"Trust works both ways, Martin."

Danny looked almost sad as he said that, and Martin couldn't help but give him a gentle hug. "It doesn't matter," he said.

"Yes it does. I trust you, too. It's just... You're the only person I've ever tried to explain this too, and I don't know how I do it. I just do it."

"Huh?"

"Ever since I was little, I've sometimes been able to find lost stuff. I'd see the couch and just know where Dad's pen had fallen into it, or be able to tell Mom where she'd put her glasses down. I think I must have scared them once or twice, because they made me promise not to tell anyone else where things were. After they died, that promise was pretty much all I had left of them."

Martin just held Danny gently, knowing how hard it still was for Danny to talk about his parents. It was hard enough for him to get his head around what Danny was saying anyway. "It was good advice," he said eventually. "A lot of people might have tried to exploit you if they knew."

Danny snorted. "Oh yeah, I learned that lesson real quick."

"So you just see where missing people are?"

"It's not even that, really." Danny frowned, struggling for the right words. "I don't see them as such, I just sometimes know where they are. Sometimes I get a feel for what state they're in too, like yesterday. I knew you were hurt, I just didn't know how badly."

"Ow," Martin said sympathetically.

"If I'd known it was just a bruised ego..."

Martin glared at him. "Then we wouldn't have spent the night together."

"True, that would have been bad," Danny said teasingly. Then he slipped back into the melancholy mood that his confession had started. "You know what my biggest problem is? I have to come up with some plausible reason for tracking people down. Knowing where a kidnapper is hiding out but not being able to come up with a single good reason for knowing? That's frustrating."

"Knowing where a little girl's lying hurt," Martin said softly, "and having to find someone to point you that way because your partner's being an ass... I'm sorry."

"Hey, none of that. You couldn't have known, and a lot of the time you'd be right anyway."

"Have you ever thought of telling Jack? Surely he'd cut you some slack to save lives?"

"I'd still have to figure something out for the official report, and believe me anything you write in them will come back and bite you. Eventually someone higher up the food chain would figure it out."

Martin considered what his father would do with someone like Danny. "Point."

Danny sighed. "Anyway, now you know."

Martin looked him square in the eyes. "Thank you," he said formally. "I... This means a lot to you, doesn't it? Telling me, I mean."

Danny nodded briefly, not looking up at Martin.

"It means a lot to me too. Thank you for trusting me. I hope... no, I will be worthy of that trust."

Danny did look up at that. "You're not going all noble and sentimental on me, are you?" he asked, raising his eyebrows and smirking a little.

Martin was tempted to banter back, but this was too important. "Yes, I am. I want you to know that I'll keep this secret, no matter what. You are that important to me."

"Oh, and how important is that?"

"Don't push it."

They laughed together for a moment, then sobered. "You're taking this very calmly," Danny observed, his smile firmly back in place.

Martin shrugged, unable to damp his own smile down. "I trust you," he said simply. "Weird as this is, I can't help but believe you." It was true, he couldn't help it; for once his much-maligned gut feelings had his brain in a stranglehold. "I can freak out later if you'd like, but I didn't think you wanted Vivian to come across me going 'Oh my God, my boyfriend's psychic.'"

Danny's grin widened. "I could live with the boyfriend bit," he said.

Martin rolled his eyes. "Come on, we need to move before Jack decides we've both been kidnapped."

As they left the apartment, Martin couldn't wipe the smile off his face. He'd spent so much of his time trying to get out from under the label of being Victor Fitzgerald's son that he hadn't been able to think of himself in relation to anyone. Danny hadn't been so very different, not letting anyone beneath the surface after his parents died. The two of them had almost lost themselves in their own lives.

Well, they were found now.


End file.
